OCOEE RANGERS

SCORES & RANKING – October 22, 2005

Overall Score = The total of Rank of all stages    Overall Rank = The ranking of shooters by overall score  Overall Time = The sum of scores of stages       Misses = Total shots missed on all stages     Total Stages = Number of stages with no recorded missed shots  Red type indicates a clean match (In the event of ties in Overall Score, the tied shooter with the lowest Overall Time is ranked higher)

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Volume 3, Issue No. 10                                              September,  2005

60 shooters participate in Halloween shootout!

The weather forecast called for rain, but it didn’t.  Rain that is.  And by the end of the day, the sky was a fantastic blue.  Of course Marshall Too Tall was also a little blue:  Ocoee Red finished 3 positions above him.  All in all, it was a very good day.  Several shooters visited with us for the first time, and 1 shot his very first cowboy shoot. Then Festus D. Deputy went over to his carriage, took out a monster of a shotgun, and took it over for Horseshoe John to try out.  The Tennessee cowboys, all of whom have Tennessee in their alias, are seen holding it below.  It had a stock extension and a longer barrel added. Horseshoe John shouldered the gun, looked down the barrel at the bead sight, which seemed about an acre away, and reached for the trigger.  But he couldn’t reach it.  That made the cannon a crew served weapon:  for you civilian fellers, that means that it takes more than 1 person to shoot the gun. After seeing that Horseshoe wasn’t up to using his gun, Festus returned it to his carriage.

TENNESSEE COWBOYS

L- R:  Tennessee Tombstone, Tennessee Ted, Tennessee Jake & Tennessee Mongo

                      Unpleasant – Top Gun                             Roma Jane – top cowgirl shooter

Unpleasant was the Top Gun of the day, and Roma Jane was the top cowgirl shooter.  Pleasant and Marshal Too Tall split the Buffalo Shoot:  Pleasant was 1st in the Long Range shoot, and Too Tall was 1st in the .22 cal. event.  11 cowboys shot no-miss matches: Pleasant, Ocoee Red, Festus D. Deputy, RIP Overland, Dustin Clays, Fast Harley, Catoosa Kid, Caliber .45, Bad Arm Slim, Ruckus Roy and the Rev. Adam Jones (our weatherman).

Wranglers are important folks.  They are the cowboys & cowgirls that put forward extra effort working in their posses during the shoot.  October Wranglers were Shadrack Jones, Bad Arm Slim, Lighting McCoy, John Daniel, Dajango Slim, Huckleberry Don and Sheriff Donald.

SHOOT RESULTS:  Top Gun – Unpleasant    Buffalo Shoot:  .22 cal –  Marshal Too Tall  Long Range  – Pleasant

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The Ocoee Ranger page 2               October 2005

The Reel West  –  Richard Carlson 

1912 – 1977

Richard Carlson was an actor, writer and director, who during his career appeared on stage on Broadway, in Hollywood movies and on television.  Born in Minnesota in 1912, he attended the University of Minnesota where he studied drama. Writing, performing in and directing plays, he graduated with a Masters in Arts degree and stayed to teach.  But that wasn’t his cup of tea. So, he left and started a stage production company.  Artistically, it was a good experience, but financially, it flopped. So, he went to Hollywood, then to Broadway, then back to Hollywood.  Back in Hollywood, he did some acting and directing.  Then WWII came along, and he marched away to play a sailor for Uncle Sam for 4 ½ years. 

Richard Carlson

(Gen. George Crook wore a hat like this chasing Geronimo)

When Richard returned to Hollywood after the war, he was older and wasn’t offered the same kinds of roles that he’d had before the war. But he hung in and reestablished himself in the movie business.  During the ‘50s, he appeared in a number of B movie science fiction and horror films. Do you remember The Creature From The Black Lagoon?  (Whiskey River Nelson will say, “No.  Way before me.”) Richard appeared in that flick. He was the hero, and he and the creature were both after the affections of Julie Adams.  Richard won.

From 1953 through 1956, Richard starred in the TV series, I Led Three Lives.  He played an advertising executive who was a spy for the FBI, infiltrating the communist party in the U.S. He also directed TV shows and some movies and some were Westerns: examples, Four Guns to the Border in 1954 and The Saga of Hemp Brown in 1958.  If you look in ‘50s Westerns, you’ll occasionally see ol’ Richard in them, usually as an Army officer, such as the role he played in Seminole. Then in 1958 and 1959, he played Colonel Ranald Mackenzie in the TV series Mackenzie’s Raiders, a show about an Old West cavalry officer who each week secretly lead a troop of cavalry across the Rio Grande in pursuit of bad folks.

After Mackenzie’s Raiders, Richard continued to act in television until his retirement.  He died in 1977.

Colonel Mortimer

The West  Of Our Imagination – Colonel Mortimer

“I’ve been shootin’ cowboy for 2 years now. I first ran in to T-Bone and some of his sidekicks at a gun show several years ago and got interested in the Cowboy Shooting thing. It took several years to muster up the nerve to actually get into it. Figured I’d wait till I could afford all the accouterments. I finally realized that would probably never happen, so a couple of years ago I took out my visa card, held my breath, jumped in the deep end and have been enjoying it ever since.

The alias thing was kind a tough. Colonel Mortimer doesn’t sound awfully cool. But Lee Van Cleef, playing Colonel Mortimer opposite Clint Eastwood in For a Few Dollars More, was one real tough hombre. Especially when he uttered those immortal words, “This train will stop at Tucumcari.” … You’d have to be there I guess.

I started out shooting a Liberty and an American Western (pistols). Both good guns. My current favorites are a pair of Cimarron stainless P models. I started on a Stoeger double barrel (shotgun), but now enjoy shooting a Model 97. A stainless model 92 EMF Hartford round barrel carbine rounds out the ensemble. It’s a real joy to shoot.

My favorite movie has to be Tombstone. Great characters, great costumes and guns. John Wayne is my favorite cowboy. He pretty much sums up the Spirit of the Old West.”      (Written by Colonel Mortimer)

The Real West  –  Ranald Mackenzie  1840 – 1889

Ranald Mackenzie was a Yankee horse soldier, and a very good one.  Born in New York City, which we won’t hold against him, he attended the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, graduating 1st in his class the year after George Custer graduated last.  But regardless of their class standings, both Mackenzie and Custer were no-holds-barred horse soldiers and both served with distinction in the War of Northern Aggression. When the war ended, both were Major Generals.  Following that war, both Mackenzie and Custer were reassigned to keep order in the West, Mackenzie as a Colonel of the 4th Cavalry and Custer as Lieutenant Colonel of the 7th Cavalry.

Ranald Mackenzie

Mackenzie served in the Southwest, fighting Comanches, Apaches, Southern Cheyennes, Mexican bandits and other folks who raided and killed in the Southwestern territory. Among the Comanches, he was known as “Bad Hand”, because of a battle wound which removed 2 fingers from his hand.  But bad hand or not, he and his soldiers fought many battles.  Shucks,ol “Bad Hand” even invaded Mexico in pursuit of 1 band on Indians. While that was technically an act of war, neither the Mexican government nor the U.S. paid much attention.  Both wanted the killing and raids back and forth across the border to stop.

History is fickle.  In fact, the definition sometimes given to history is “myth that we accept as fact.”  Generations have different versions of political correctness, and they tend to look at things that happened in the past in the light of their current mind set. Where’s this going?  Well, in his day, Ranald Mackenzie was a hero to the settlers in Texas.  In 1874, he and his command broke the Comanche nation and ended their roaming, big-time threat in the southwest. Mackenzie and his forces located the Comanches and Southern Cheyenne in winter camp in Palo Duro Canyon, near present day Amarillo, TX.  They attacked, killed a bunch of folks, destroyed more than 1,000 horses, and burned their winter food and supplies, which forced the survivors to go to reservations.  The threat from the Comanches was ended.  Some current apologists consider Mackenzie a villain because he destroyed the Comanche way of life.  Of course, they don’t have to fear nighttime raids and death while asleep, like settlers did in the 1870’s.

Over the years, Mackenzie had other assignments in several western states and earned promotion to Brigadier General, before he was forced to retire in 1884 after he developed mental illness and was declared insane.  He died on January 19, 1889.

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The Ocoee Ranger page 3                    October  2005

VINEGAROON (AKA JERRY HARPER)

COWBOY CRAFTSMAN

By Dustin Clays

The engraving of this 1866 Yellowboy rifle is the handiwork of Vinegaroon, aka Jerry Harper, who is a founding member of the Smoky Mountain Shootist Society (Knoxville Cowboy Shooters) and an occasional Ocoee Rangers shooter.   This rifle represents Nimschke in style, one of Jerry’s favorite engravers from the late 19th century.  Actually the Mexican eagle and scroll design is straight from an 1866 that Nimschke engraved. Nimschke was one of the great engravers from the period of 1850-1900 and, in Jerry’s opinion, maybe the best engraver of all time. Along with Colts and Winchesters, Nimschke also engraved many Sharps rifles and Smith and Wesson revolvers and did much non-firearm engraving.

1866 Uberti /Winchester Rifle Engraved by Vinegaroon

Another favorite engraver who has influenced Jerry’s work was also a German by the name of Cuno Helfricht who had a shop in the Colt factory and worked directly for Colt. Ulrich is another favorite engraver of Jerry’s who worked directly for Winchester.  

Jerry has been engraving guns for forty years and during that time has engraved weapons for many well-known personalities. Among these, he engraved Colts for Lash LaRue, B western star of the 1940’s, and he also engraved Johnny Cash’s favorite revolver.   Though we cowboys know Jerry as a fellow shooter, engraver, and gunsmith, there is another side to Jerry. He is also a scholar and professor emeritus, who for many years was chairman of the Foreign Languages department at Carson-Newman College. The Mexican Eagle (which is shown on the rifle above) has been a favorite of Jerry’s since his college days when he developed an interest in the influence of the Spanish in the southwest.  While doing his graduate work at UCLA, in his spare time he learned basic engraving with a hammer and chisel and how to sharpen his tools from an old German gunsmith.

Whether making a spring, bluing a barrel, tuning a gun, replacing parts that are no longer available, or completely restoring a priceless old revolver, rifle or shotgun, Jerry can do it. And he is always willing to help out a fellow cowboy or cowgirl at a match who is having gun problems.  Jerry’s knowledge, craftsmanship and willingness to share his talents are greatly admired and appreciated by all who know him.

Vinegaroon ( aka Jerry Harper)

MISS PEARL’S PARLOR HOUSE ATTRACTS SEVERAL OCOEE RANGERS

Miss Pearl’s Parlor House Attracts Ranger Roger &  Marshal Too Tall

In September, a whole gang of Ocoee Rangers descended on Miss Pearl’s Parlor House and had a real carousing time.  Would you believe it?  Now before you send the Rev. Adam Jones out to chastise them, Miss Pear’s Parlor House is 1 of the stage settings in the Town of Cavern Cove, home of the North Alabama Regulators cowboy shooters.  And the gang of Ocoee Rangers were there participating in the Alabama State Cowboy Action Shooting Championship , Ambush at Cavern Cove.

The top shooting Ocoee Ranger was Festus D. Deputy, who placed 14th overall and 4th as a 49er.  Horseshoe John placed 1st as a Sr. Duelist, and 48th overall.

Other Ocoee Rangers shooters and the positions in which they placed are as follows:  Sunshine Billy 22, Marshal Too Tall 25, Ocoee Red 26, Cherokee Maddog 38, Ranger Roger 61, Tennessee Jake 105 and T-Bone Angus 120.  Tennessee Jake and Festus both shot perfect /no miss matches.  164 shooters participated in the event.

No Misses For These Shooters

                     Tennessee Jake                                              Festus D. Deputy 

1t Place Senior Duelist

Horseshoe John

OCOEE RANGERS

SCORES & RANKING – September 24, 2005

Overall Score = The total of Rank of all stages    Overall Rank = The ranking of shooters by overall score  Overall Time = The sum of scores of stages       Misses = Total shots missed on all stages     Total Stages = Number of stages with no recorded missed shots  Red type indicates a clean match (In the event of ties in Overall Score, the tied shooter with the lowest Overall Time is ranked higher)

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SEPTEMBER,  2005

3 cowboys & 2 cowgirls have no misses at September shoot!

September on the range was … well, it was very pleasant, not to be confused with the shooter of the same name.  While Hurricane Rita was pounding the Texas-Louisiana coast, the 61 cowgirl and cowboy shooters who ventured out to save the West from the metal bad guys were pounding and pinging and gently thumping the targets.  In the process, 2 cowgirls (Mustang Megs and Shootin’ Sue) and 3 cowboys (Marshal Too Tall, Owlhoot Hardin, and Tennessee Ted) shot matches without misses.  This was the 1st time 2 cowgirls shot no-miss matches on the same day.

L-R kneeling:  Yankee Dutchman, Catoosa Kid, Marshal Too Tall, Awful Close, Dijango Slim. Standing: Deadfoot, Fast Harley, Mustang Megs, Timberland Renegade, Festus D. Deputy, Last Kiss, and Ocoee Red – posse leader.

Mustang Megs –

No Misses

Mustang Megs and her other half, Timberland Renegade, were visiting the Ocoee Rangers while on vacation in Pigeon Forge.  Hailing from Pennsylvania, they learned that we were shooting, and added our shoot to their vacation plans. Both shot very well and were such standout workers in their posse that they were recognized as Ocoee Ranger Wranglers.

Shootin’ Sue –

No Misses

How’d the shooting go?  Well, Curly Bill was the Top Gun, closely followed by Slater and Marshal Too Tall.  Mustang Megs was the top cowgirl shooter.  Marshal Too Tall won both categories (.22 Cal. and Long Range) at the Buffalo Shoot.  Unpleasant shot so fast that it was hard for the spotters to keep up with hits & misses when he shot his pistols.  And the CatoosaKid had smoke rolling through the trees from his black powder shooting firearms.  Simply stated, it was a terrific day and a very good shoot.

SHOOT RESULTS:  Top Gun – Curly Bill    Buffalo Shoot:  .22 cal –  Marshal Too Tall  Long Range  – Marshal Too Tall

Classic   1. Fast Harley

Wranglers – Slater, Tennessee Ted, Keystone, Mustang Megs, Timberland Renegade, Bad Arm Slim, Whiskey River Nelson, Slingin’ Dunn

NEXT OCOEE RANGER SHOOT – 22 OCTOBER  .. The Buffalo Shoot begins 8:00 am. Registration 8:30 am  –  Posse Leader walk-through 9:15 am  – Safety meeting 9:45 am  –  Shooting follows !  All times are Eastern Time.

TURKEY SHOOT AT NOVEMBER SHOOT

… Turkeys as prizes for turkeys/shooters

who win. Details later.

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The Ocoee Ranger page 2,    September 2005

The Reel West, The Real West

and the West of Our Imagination

The Reel West – Buck Taylor

Clarence Taylor III was born in California in 1938.  Fortunately for him, Clarence acquired a nickname and became Buck. As a youngster, he worked in stables around movie horses, and as a result learned to ride.  Although his pop was in the Western movie business, his dad was Dub Taylor, Buck didn’t have a horse of his own.  Later, he entered the movie business himself and gravitated toward Westerns.  In 1967, he joined the TV cast of GUNSMOKE and became Newly O’Brien for about 7 years. As Newly, he had a real unusual career:  he was a gunsmith, who became an apprentice doctor and an apprentice lawyer and also intermittently served as a deputy marshal.  How’s that for a jack-of-all-trades?  Of course if you were lying on his

Buck Taylor as Newly O’Brien while appearing on the long running TV Western GUNSMOKE

operating table, you might have thoughts like:  is he going to sew me up like a doc’s patient or as a gunsmith’s holster? But if he screwed up, he could put on his lawyer hat and represent himself as a misunderstood lawman just passing through chasing bad guys who just tried to be a Good Samaritan and sorta understandably goofed up a little.

Self portrait in watercolor by Buck Taylor

Since his GUNSMOKE days, Buck’s appeared in a lot of movies, most of them Westerns, such as TOMBSTONE, JERICHO, CONAGHER, and lots of others.  He’s a real cowboy in real life and looks the part of the grizzled cowboys that he plays.  But there’s also another side to Buck.  He’s a terrific Western artist, painting pictures in watercolor. He’s done posters for major rodeos and stock shows, commissioned paintings, portraits, and many other paintings that various art dealers peddle for him. Of course he stays very busy, although he’s now in his 60’s.  His wife is a rodeo barrel racer and horse trainer, and he travels to a lot of rodeos.  And he still appears

in many movie roles.  And he raises horses.  And he paints.  But remember, as Newly O’Brien, Buck wore many hats, and that appears to have been good training for his very varied and busy life style.

The West of Our Imagination – Squire Shooter

Squire Shooter has been a Cowboy Shooter for 3 years.  He read about Cowboy Action Shooting on the internet, then investigated it.  How? Well, he saddled up and rode out to the Cleveland range and starting shooting with us. That tells you 2 things: (1) he’s an experienced cowboy shooter and (2) he has good judgment in picking shooting companions.  After deciding to be a cowboy shooter, he turned his attention to selecting an alias.  He thought and thought, and he decided that he was an honest feller.  So, why not become

Squire Shooter

Square Shooter.  Sounded good. In fact, it was so good that somebody else had already staked a claim to it. So, he decided to choose something close:  Squire Shooter. And that’s who he became.

What does he shoot?  Vaquero six-shooters and a Marlin rifle, shooting .38’s. Like Pleasant.  But his favorite cowboy is a .45 caliber person: John Wayne.

What does he like best about cowboy shooting?  “I’ve always liked period guns.  This gives me an excuse to buy and shoot more guns.”  Whatever his reason, being a cowboy shooter is a real reward.

Buck Taylor –

“King of the Cowboys”

THE REAL WEST – BUCK TAYLOR

? – 1924

Did you know that Buck Taylor was the 1st “King of the Cowboys”?  It’s true.  Of course that Buck Taylor, William Levi Taylor, came along well before Roy Rogers laid claim to the title.  He had the title in 1885. But not many people remember ol’ Buck.  You see, he was a cowboy back in the days when Buffalo Bill was in show business.  Buck and his brother trailed cattle up from Texas and somehow ended up working on Buffalo Bill’s ranch.  Ever watchful for arena performers, Bill hired Buck, who was about 6 ft. 5 in. tall, to work in his Wild West Show.  Of course at that time, cowboys were a dime a dozen. But Buffalo Bill, a man with a world-recognized title, gave Buck a title of his own: King of the Cowboys.  Then he had him grow his hair long, decked him out to look real flashy and paraded him out to perform. Shucks, sometimes Buck even wore jaguar spotted chaps.

Now traveling around as a cowboy in such legendary company just naturally resulted in Buck gaining fame, if not fortune.  Some enterprising writer wrote a dime novel in which Buck was the hero, and it was published. In it, Buck rescued damsels in distress from Indians. It was called THE COWBOY CLAN; OR THETIGRESS OF TEXAS. A ROMANCE OF BUCK TAYLOR AND HIS BOYS IN BUCKSKIN. How’s that for a title?

But ol’ Buck lived up to it.  He performed with Annie Oakley, Sitting Bull, and ol’ Buffalo Bill himself, among many others in Bill’s world famous Wild West Show.  After his days of performing with Buffalo Bill ended, Buck started his own show.  He died in Pennsylvania in 1924.

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The Ocoee Ranger page 3    September 2005

CHRISTMAS 2004 ANNUAL SHOOT & FAMILY EVENT   VENDOR  SPONSORS ..

Please remember the sponsors of our 2004 Christmas Shoot and Family Event as you buy cowboy & cowgirl things and give lists for potential gifts to friends and loved ones for this Christmas.  They helped us.  Let’s help them.

Ø      LEGENDS OUTDOOR ADVANTAGE – Athens, TN

2110 South Congress Parkway Athens, Tennessee  

Phone: (423) 746-2321

Ø      EAGLE GRIPS – Eagle Business Center

460 Randy Road, 

Carol Stream, IL 60188

phone:  800-323-6144 

fax: 630-260-0486

email:  sales@eaglegrips.com 

Ø      STARLINE BRASS CO. –

1300 West Henry , Sedalia, MO  phone:  800-280-6660

             660-827-6640

FAX 660-827-6650   email info@starlinebrass.com

Ø      SHOOT! MAGAZINE –

7154 W. State St. #384,

Boise, ID 83714  

 phone: 1-800-342-0904   www.shootmagazine.com

Ø      SADDLEBAG BULLETS –  (Cool Waters)

Randy Gothart  phone:  (256) 776-4909

Ø      TRUE WEST MAGAZINE –

True West Publishing, Inc.

Phone: 1-888-687-1881

Email: info@twmag.com

Ø      BOOTH WESTERN ART MUSEUM – Cartersville, GA

501 Museum Dr ,  

Cartersville GA 30120 phone: 770-387-1300  www.boothmuseum.org

Ø      JAXONBILT HAT COMPANY, Salmon, Idaho

Roy Jackson,  P.O. Box 417

Salmon, ID 83467

Phone:  (208) 756-6444

email: jaxonbilthats@salmoninternet.com

Ø      LOGAN’S ROADHOUSE – Cleveland, TN

3940 Keith St NW, Cleveland,TN 37312

Ø      BENTON SHOOTERS SUPPLY – Benton, TN

www.bentonshooters.com

Ø      TEXAS JACK’S WILD WEST OUTFITTERS

Phone:  800-TEXJACK

 Fax: (830) 997-6074

Website:      www.texasjacks.com

Ø      GOLDEN CORRAL restaurant – Cleveland, TN

388 Stuart Rd NE, Cleveland, TN 37312

Ø      TERRY’S TOYS  (old west guns) –

T-Bone Angus

Phone:  (423) 899-9807

Ø      HAMILTON DRY GOODS – Sparta, TN

Ron Hamilton, Hamilton Dry Goods,

4575 Roberts Matthews Hwy, Sparta, TN

store:  931-739-6061

home: 931-528-6061

email:  hamiltondrygoods@multipro.com

Ø      CALICO LASSIE – LADIES VICTORIAN AND OLD WEST ACCOUTREMENTS AND ACCESSORIES

Frances C. Orgeron, 

251 Bayou Crossing Drive,

Raceland, LA 70394 

(985) 532-5371 (phone & fax)

Email:  frances@calocolassie.com *

* Calico Lassie is located in the hurricane-affected area of Louisiana.  If the lady is still in business, I’m sure she would appreciate our business, just as she helped us, by being a sponsor.

Cool Waters – Mr. Saddlebag Bullets

Ocoee Rangers Who Were Vendors In Sept

If you’ve ever looked around, even casually, at our monthly shoots, you’ve probably noticed that several folks who attend are either business people selling products, or are casual peddlers of various products.

Cool Waters is a shooter, although he’s had health problems and hasn’t been able to shoot much this year, and a businessman.  Many of us shoot his bullets, Saddlebag Bullets.  He makes them.

Outrider’s another craftsman shooter.  He makes and sells holsters, belts, spur straps, shoulder/saddlebags and other products. Curly Bill’s another leather-smith shooter.  He makes a line of top quality holsters and belts.  Look around at the Cleveland & Knoxville shoots, and you’ll see many examples of his products on shooters, including this word scratcher.T-Bone Angus completes the circle.  He sells guns, pistols & long guns. 

Outrider poses with his leather goods.

T-Bones’s Booth.  He’s elsewhere.